


The Third Man

by Purna



Category: Stargate Atlantis, The Third Man (1949)
Genre: Community: reel_sga, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-06-16
Updated: 2006-06-16
Packaged: 2018-02-09 07:53:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1974903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Purna/pseuds/Purna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My story for the reel_sga community.<br/>Movie Prompt: The Third Man (1949)<br/>Movie Summary:<br/>Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) arrives in a Vienna still shattered by WWII, expecting to meet his old friend Harry Lime. But Lime has apparently been accidentally killed, and Martins, too curious for his own good, hears contradictory stories about the circumstances of Lime’s death. Witnesses disappear or are murdered. Martins himself is chased by unknown assailants through the glamorously dark streets of Vienna. Complicating matters are the sardonic Major Calloway (Trevor Howard), head of the British forces, and Lime’s mistress, Anna Schmidt (Alida Valli).</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Third Man

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to lamardeuse for a speedy beta. It's difficult to improve on the collective genius of Graham Greene and Carol Reed. There are many lines of dialogue either adapted from or lifted directly from the movie.

I'll warn you now, you asked for this. You're here for a story; I'll give you a story. It's an ugly one, and I doubt it's what General Landry had in mind when he sent you here. Some Atlantis PR crap.   
  
A thousand journalists, a thousand articles -- it won't make the public any happier when they finally hear about SGC and the Pegasus galaxy and how close Earth came to being culled by the Wraith.   
  
What? Yeah, we defeated the Wraith. Happy ending, right?   
  
Not so fast, because it wasn't easy. Well, you saw the damage yourself; half the city's still in ruins.  
  
We were on the brink too many times to count. Atlantis would have fallen, except for the Genii.   
  
There was a price to pay, of course. There always is. A "strategic alliance." Yeah, right. A piece of Atlantis was what they wanted, even bombed and half-flooded as it was then. It might not have been the Atlantis from before the Wraith war, but we were better off than a lot of other worlds.   
  
So now the Genii have their zone, and we've got ours, and refugees from a dozen worlds bounce between us. We patch them up, get them healthy, find them a planet for resettlement.   
  
The Wraith sickness is the biggest problem, although even that's curable if we catch it in time. Thank God the Wraith sucked at creating bio weapons. You got the shots back at SGC, I hope.   
  
It's curable, but you wouldn't like the experience. No, those are just rumors; the treatment drugs work. The deaths, those kids last year -- that was bad, but it wasn't the drugs that failed. It was us not catching the adulterated drug supply in time to save them.   
  
Yeah, that's the ugly story I'm talking about. I guess I should start at the beginning.  
  
*  
  
"It's not your fault," Rodney said, wandering out of the bathroom, the words garbled by the toothbrush in his mouth. John looked up from his laptop, open on the desk in front of him. Rodney was in his boxers and an old, faded Air Force T-shirt, getting ready for bed.   
  
With the hand not holding the toothbrush, Rodney scratched absently at his chest. The scar beneath his fingers wasn't visible, hidden underneath Rodney's shirt, but John knew it was there all the same.   
  
Rodney stopped scratching, suddenly aware of John's gaze, and said thickly, "Don't be stupid. It's really, really not your fault." He wiped some of the toothpaste drool from his mouth with the back of his hand.   
  
His eyes darted over John, pausing on his face, moving down to the jittery up and down movement of his right knee. John forced himself to stop fidgeting, feeling a little uncomfortable under Rodney's assessing gaze. That almost scary focus was usually concentrated on Ancient machinery or fixing some problem, but from the first, Rodney had seemed to see John as a puzzle of a different sort, requiring his attention.  
  
Rodney's expectant expression called for an answer of some sort. "I went to visit the two kids today--" John found himself starting to say, before he bit back the words. He hadn't meant to talk about it. Hadn't wanted to lay all his crap onto Rodney, whose shoulders already carried the weight of bringing Atlantis back to life.   
  
The kids -- it was awful, worse even than the ones who'd died. Still alive, but frozen in the middle of a horrible metamorphosis. It made him think of things he usually kept locked down tight, in the dark, shadowy basement of his head.   
  
"Jeez, John," Rodney said, his blue eyes shadowed.  
  
John dropped his gaze back down to the laptop screen. Paging listlessly through the infirmary personnel file, he avoided Rodney's eyes. He had thought he'd seemed calm, but he couldn't fool Rodney.  
  
Rodney ducked back into the bathroom to rinse out his mouth and then moved over to stand behind him. Rodney leaned into him, draping his arms around John's neck from behind in a loose embrace.  
  
"Snap out of it, Sheppard," he said into John's ear, his tone gentler than his words. "I know you. You've got a  _thing_  about guilt. You'd agonize over your contribution to Earth's global warming. Okay, maybe that's hyperbole," he added when John just  _looked_  at him. "But this?  _So_  not your fault."  
  
"The black market--"  _is my fault_ , he meant to say, but Rodney cut him off.  
  
"Cut it out." Rodney smacked a hand onto John's chest, sharp enough to sting. John jumped a little and shot Rodney a startled look. Rodney muttered, "Oh, great, domestic violence. We're turning into my parents."   
  
He sighed, knowing Rodney was trying to distract him more than anything, but there was a faint undercurrent of something in Rodney's voice. Something a little dark that John couldn't quite decipher. "Easy there, Rodney," he said, in the affectionate tone that meant  _we're okay_. Rodney shot him the look that meant  _you're an asshole, but I love you anyway._    
  
A few years of them sleeping together and at some point John had realized that they'd started having entire conversations with a couple of looks. It was then he was pretty sure he was as close to married as he'd ever get. An obnoxious, smart-mouthed, brilliant scientist was the last person he'd ever expected to end up hitched to, but then again he'd never really expected to survive the Wraith war, either.  
  
John pulled Rodney's face down to his, shutting Rodney up with his mouth, letting himself sink into the kiss. Kissing was almost as good a mood-enhancer as flying, and tasted better, minty, Rodney's tongue as eager and hot as the first time they'd done this.   
  
It made him smile against Rodney's mouth. This was good at least, the two of them. It made something ache in his chest, ache in the best way, that after so long they still fit together so well, still couldn't get enough of each other.   
  
He was twisted around in his chair, craning his neck to meet Rodney's mouth. It was awkward and made his neck hurt, but he didn't stop for a long time.   
  
"Those kids -- I hate thinking about it," he admitted once he'd caught his breath, after the kissing had stopped.  
  
Rodney's mouth turned down. "Carson's kicking himself because of his woefully inadequate inventory controls. He was treating a dozen Wraith sickness patients with tap water, and didn't even know it. It's amazing that any of them lived. Without treatment, the result is usually death."  
  
"Except in the rare cases when it actually works the way the Wraith intended," John said, his voice hollow.  
  
Rodney swallowed. "The transformation. Yeah. I don't like to think about that part. I know Carson doesn't ever talk about it -- who can blame him. It can't be a coincidence that the Wraith mimicked Carson's own strategy." He stopped short at John's look. "What? You know it's true."  
  
John closed his eyes. "Can we not talk about that right now? Please?"  
  
"Carson's working on it. Maybe he can change them back," Rodney said, after a long pause. His tone was softer; by now, Rodney knew when to push him and when to leave things alone.   
  
John's lips tightened. "There's nothing he can do at this point. Those kids are as good as dead. I know, Rodney. I remember losing Zelenka and Ronon and Simpson. I remember coming  _this_  close to losing you."   
  
Zelenka and Ronon had died outright, but Simpson. Simpson had not. John shuddered; he wasn't going there. He wasn't going to think about the fact that there were enough mercy killings on his conscience to last two lifetimes.  
  
The infection had progressed much more slowly in Rodney. Beckett had devised an experimental treatment just barely in time to use him as a guinea pig, but the cure had been almost as deadly as the sickness, wreaking havoc on most of Rodney's organs. His heart had suffered the worst; Beckett had said a transplant would've been his only hope back on Earth. In the end, it'd been too close, another Pegasus galaxy hail mary, Beckett cracking Rodney's chest to implant the Ancient equivalent of an artificial heart.  
  
John's hands were clenched so tightly they ached. He loosened them deliberately and looked up at Rodney. "I remember it all. I can't forget it."   
  
Rodney kneaded the muscles of his shoulders, the touch almost painful. "I know you can't, John." Fingers brushed over John's ear, making him shiver. "There's plenty of guilt to pass around. The asshole that stole the drugs gets the lion's share. Don't try to take it all on yourself. Concentrate on figuring out what the hell happened."  
  
He reached up to give Rodney's hand a quick squeeze, then moved to tap at the laptop's touchpad.   
  
"Anyway," he said, trying to marshal his thoughts. "Some time after the last Earth shipment, someone stole the treatment drugs from the infirmary stock room."   
  
He trailed off and swallowed. Thinking about the Wraith sickness was a bad enough, but it mixed uneasily with images from his own brush with the iratus bug, made him remember Michael and Beckett's bioweapon.  
  
"Sheppard," Rodney said sharply. "You with me, here?"  
  
Rodney's voice had an almost military snap to it that shook him out of it, and John rolled his eyes to hide his relief. He cleared his throat and said, "He or she substituted vials filled with saline, so that the theft would not be immediately noticed." His voice was only a little rough.  
  
Rodney eyed him carefully and sounded thoughtful when he said, "Access, opportunity and the knowledge to select the right medicines: it all makes for an inside job, doesn't it?"  
  
At John's look of surprise, Rodney said, "Hello, genius here." He sounded a little offended, waggling his fingers at his head. "It's just applied science, after all."  
  
"And you're the man as far as science goes," he said wryly. He sobered, looking back at the file open on his laptop. "Carson doesn't want to think so, but it's one of his staff." He scrolled through the names of infirmary personnel. "Everyone on this list had access to the pharmacy inventory."  
  
Sliding a hand inside the collar of John's shirt, Rodney pushed past John's dog tags to tweak a nipple. It made John sigh and close his eyes.   
  
Rodney stole a kiss, quick, with just a hint of tongue. "You're tired. Deal with it tomorrow."  
  
That night in bed, Rodney pushed him back onto the sheets and blew him. John's cock slid in deep, welcomed into Rodney's warm, wide mouth, and it felt like home. When he looked down, he couldn't help groaning at the sight: Rodney's mouth on him, his lips sliding wetly up and down John's cock.  
  
Rodney looked up just then and paused as their eyes met. Heat and affection in Rodney's eyes mixed with a strange vulnerability that made John go a little lightheaded, his breath catching in a way that was close to pain. He reached down to slide a hand through Rodney's soft, fine hair.  
  
"Jesus, Rodney," he said breathlessly, his voice almost breaking, and Rodney went back to what he was doing, taking him in deep again. There was no teasing, just a strong, no-frills suck that brought him off quickly. He thought about asking Rodney to fuck him, hard and fast, but Rodney looked too tired for anything fancy. Considering how beat John himself felt, it was just as well. He figured he'd never hear the end of it if he fell asleep in the middle of having sex.   
  
He was still catching his breath when he reached over to wrap a hand around Rodney's cock. "This? Or do you want my mouth?" he asked.   
  
Rodney was already thrusting up into John's fist. "This is good. God, that's good." John stripped Rodney's cock and watched Rodney's face.   
  
They'd been together long enough that there wasn't much they hadn't done to and with each other, in and out of bed. But John always returned to this, his hand on Rodney's cock, like the first time they'd ever had sex. John had watched Rodney's face when he came that first time. He watched him now too, drinking in the sight: Rodney's head thrown back, mouth slack.   
  
He slept after that, a little afraid that it'd be a nightmare night for him, that he'd be visited by half-Wraith children or return to the dark days of the Wraith war. Instead it was Rodney's turn, his ragged whimpers waking John in the middle of the night. "Radek," Rodney muttered. "Radek," he said again and then a shouted, "John."   
  
John swallowed; it was a bad one. He shook Rodney out of the worst of it, sliding a reassuring hand over Rodney's belly. That soothed Rodney enough that he fell into a more peaceful sleep. Rodney shifted his position, settling closer to John, dropping a heavy arm across his chest.  
  
Rodney didn't like to talk about his nightmares, but he'd let things slip every now and then. Rodney reacted poorly to darkness and enclosed spaces and knives, and John wondered how many times those things worked their way into his dreams. John also knew that in their years on Atlantis Rodney had racked up almost as many ghosts as John himself had. Gall and Griffin, and John's mind flinched as the list in his head stretched on and on.   
  
Zelenka's death had nearly shattered Rodney. After that, he'd regularly worked himself to the point of exhaustion on the reconstruction efforts. It had taken John dragging him to the infirmary a few times and a close call on the cardiac front to break the self-destructive cycle. Survivor's guilt was endemic to Atlantis, Heightmeyer had told him once.   
  
So many of their number had been lost, from the Wraith attacks, from the resulting flooding, and then from the bio-engineered sickness that the Wraith had released in the final days of the war. Mentioning any name from the list of the dead could silence a room faster than the appearance of one of their Genii "allies."  
  
They wouldn't have won the war without the Genii, but John didn't have to like the resulting situation. He had to share Atlantis with the same people he'd once fought. Had to share space with people who'd killed his men, people who couldn't ever be trusted.   
  
It made for an uneasy truce, an uneasy sharing of Atlantis' resources: 'gate time, Ancient knowledge, tech. John's hatred deepened every time Rodney went silent and tense around Colonel Brodsky, the Genii liaison officer, who looked so much like Kolya that John wondered if they were related. He had never bothered to ask, though. He didn't want to know the answer.  
  
John's brain was starting to run in circles. When he got like this, he knew it would turn into a sleepless night. He wasn't wrong, and he lay there staring up at the ceiling, his only comfort Rodney's warmth along his side.  
  
*  
  
John met with Elizabeth the next morning in her office. He yawned, his eyes gritty with lack of sleep. He took one look at her tight face and knew it was bad. "What's wrong?"  
  
"We've got to get to the bottom of this one fast, John. Dead kids tend to get people stirred up."  
  
Her words triggered it: once again he back in the morgue, Carson's shaking hands pulling back the sheet to show small bodies, their muscles warped by the Wraith sickness. John's stomach tried to rebel, and he swallowed, hard, against the acid taste rising in his throat.  
  
Elizabeth's hand on his shoulder brought him out of it. She'd gotten up from her desk without him even noticing. "John? Are you okay?" she said and he got the impression that it wasn't the first time she'd said his name.  
  
He shook his head. "Sorry, Elizabeth. I'm just distracted. What was that?"   
  
She eyed him with a disbelieving look, but didn't push it. "Rumors are flying among the refugee population: that it was no accident, that refugees get substandard medical attention."  
  
"I'll talk to Teyla," John said. "The Athosians have connections there."  
  
Elizabeth nodded. "And I've had SGC on my case already this morning. They want to know if the infirmary theft means the black market situation is beyond our control. They offered their 'help.' I'd prefer that they stay out of it, quite frankly, but I can't stall them for long."  
  
John took a breath. "This is my fault. If I'd clamped down on the black market back when Caldwell told me to--"  
  
"You mean if  _we_  had." Elizabeth shot him an exasperated look. "You weren't alone in that decision, John," she said, sounding a little harried. She covered her face with her hands, pressing the tips of her fingers to her forehead, as if to massage away a headache. She didn't drop her hands and when she spoke the words were a little muffled. "The black market seemed like the least of our worries at the time. We had the city to worry about, patching it up enough so that we didn't sink, Rodney driving himself to exhaustion."  
  
John grimaced, remembering those frantic weeks. Everyone should have been celebrating, enjoying the victory over the Wraith. Instead, they all just had a different set of worries, a new and overwhelming set of tasks. The Marines and scientists that SGC had sent them had helped, but their inexperience had kept the burden on the veteran staff.  
  
Elizabeth dropped her hands and looked over at him, her eyes tired. "Refugees were still pouring in through the 'gate from all over the galaxy, needing shelter, food, and medical attention. We were just getting used to the Genii having control of their sector of Atlantis. Bootleg DVDs and scavenged fuel cells and illegal alcohol? That was at the bottom of our list of priorities."  
  
John's headset interrupted her. "Colonel Sheppard." It was Carson. He glanced over at Elizabeth, who gestured at him to take the call.   
  
"Yeah, Carson?"  
  
"One of my orderlies didn't show up for work today. Joseph Harbin's his name. No answer to radio calls, and he's not in his quarters."  
  
John relayed the information to Elizabeth, and her eyebrow went up enquiringly. Her eyes were dark when he met her gaze.   
  
John asked, "Harbin had access to the stock room?"  
  
Carson laughed, the bitterness obvious even over the crappy audio of the headset. "Aye, he did, John. You were right, I'm afraid. I was a trusting fool. It was one my own staff."  
  
"We don't know that for sure, Carson. And you're not a fool." Carson had somehow managed to keep a little of his trusting nature through the Wraith war. John wondered if this was the straw that broke that camel's back, that turned him into a cynic like the rest of them.  
  
Carson signed off without a word, and John sighed. He relayed the gist of the conversation to Elizabeth.  
  
"Harbin," Elizabeth said, leaning back in her chair. "Do you think he was alone in this?"  
  
John rubbed the back of neck and was silent a moment, thinking. "Doubtful. The market for the drugs would be in the refugee population. Harbin probably wouldn't have the connections to peddle the drugs by himself."  
  
Elizabeth's lips pressed together. "That's what I was afraid of. Go easy, John. If we look like we're targeting refugees unfairly--"  
  
He held up a hand. "I got it. I'll be careful. Their trust in us is fragile. I'll do my best not to damage it."  
  
She gave him a short nod, her gaze thoughtful.   
  
"I've got Harbin's file on my laptop," John said absently. "I'll look at it again after this. Maybe go check out his quarters."  
  
"Be careful, John. Harbin knows he'll have to answer for murder when we catch up to him. That makes him dangerous."  
  
"I know," John said, standing up from his chair. "He'll be untrained and unpredictable. I'll keep that in mind."  
  
Elizabeth gave him a strained smile. He was at the door when she spoke again. "Just think of Rodney's reaction if you let yourself get hurt."  
  
John paused, turning his head. He cocked an eyebrow at her. "He'd be unbearable, wouldn't he? Don't worry; I'm domesticated now."  
  
Elizabeth's laugh of disbelief followed him out into the corridor.  
  
*  
  
John was nearly to his office when a voice stopped him. "Colonel Sheppard. A word with you."  
  
He froze and turned around, a neutral expression firmly planted on his face. "Colonel Brodsky."  
  
The Genii's face was as unreadable as always, but John swore he heard a trace of triumph when he spoke. "I've heard the Atlanteans have had troubles. A theft from the medical supply."   
  
John took a breath. "Word gets around fast."  
  
Brodsky nodded, his eyes cold. "This black market -- it is the result of your inefficient policing methods. The Atlanteans are too lenient. I offer again the expertise of the Genii in the matter of security. The situation wants control. The refugees strain the city."  
  
John couldn't stop the frown that took over his face. "Allowing the refugees to stay was part of the treaty your people signed. Not really negotiable now. As for your offer -- that is...generous of you, Colonel. It's not necessary, however. You have your sector. We have ours. There's an old expression on Earth.  _Good fences make good neighbors._  Don't you agree?"  
  
Brodsky grunted, a flicker of displeasure crossing his face. "Hmm. The Genii have a saying, too.  _My neighbor's troubles become my own._  The Genii will swiftly deal with any troubles that spill over from your side of the city. Is that clear enough for you?"  
  
John forced himself to smile pleasantly at the Genii. "Very clear, Colonel Brodsky. The situation is under control."  
  
Brodsky gave him a dubious look, then straightened. His head dipped in a sharp nod, and John sketched a salute in return, one eyebrow raised sarcastically. He could've sworn Brodsky's heels actually clicked together when he turned away to head back to Genii territory.   
  
John walked on, frowning. He'd have to warn Elizabeth that the Genii were sniffing for weaknesses. They were reliable at least: any situation became an opportunity for them to acquire more control. Their ultimate goal was complete control of Atlantis, John was sure of it. Even as damaged as she was, Atlantis provided her owner with considerable power. The Genii didn't like to share. But frankly, neither did John.  
  
*  
  
Harbin had a Halorian girlfriend who wasn't pleased when John came calling at Harbin's quarters. She cracked the door open with a wary look in her eye. "He's not here."  
  
"Do you know where he is?" John asked. He tried out his best easy smile and hoped the expression made it into his eyes.   
  
She wasn't impressed, leaning against the doorjamb. He looked down and rubbed at the back of his neck. Rodney called it his  _aw shucks_  look, and it usually worked scarily well, but not this time. She started to close the door in his face.   
  
 _Open_ , John thought, and sighed in relief when the door responded to him. The damage during the war had been extensive. Now whole sections of the city failed to respond to him. John avoided those sections; it felt too much like being trapped inside a dead thing.  
  
"You have the Ancient blood." She was staring at him with odd, unfocused eyes. "You were on the path to Ascension. I was once on that path as well."  
  
"Huh," was all John could manage at first. "Really?" he said as a follow up. He figured he got a pass for the lame response. He was still stuck on how often he ran into Ascended and wannabe-Ascended women, and how they tended to be kind of creepy. Too much navel-gazing, he decided.  
  
"You have found peace off the path," she said.   
  
 _Peace?_  John thought incredulously, but she was still talking. "That is my goal as well." Her expression reminded John of how Teer had looked when she talked about her visions. It made the hairs on the back of John's neck prickle.   
  
She stepped back. "Come inside."  
  
John felt more like running away, but he followed her inside, his smile fading. "Uh. It was sort of an accident, me doing the whole Ascension thing. Didn't get very far with it."  
  
She smiled at him, a little wistfully. "I am Malla. I started on the path as a child. Along the way, you develop--"  
  
"Interesting talents," John interrupted, holding up a hand. "Yeah, so I've heard. Listen--"  
  
She cut him off; her eyes had gone a little spooky again. "Poor, weak Joseph. What has he done? It's bad, isn't it?"  
  
Blinking at the sudden shift in topic, John didn't say anything for a second. "It's bad. He stole drugs from the infirmary. Drugs to treat the Wraith sickness."  
  
Malla went white, closing her eyes. "Oh, Joseph," she said. She opened her eyes. "It wasn't his idea. I know it wasn't. This is my fault, really."   
  
"How so?" John asked curiously.  
  
"I was the one who introduced him around the Halorian quarter. That's where he met them." She sat down on the couch, her feet tucked up underneath her.   
  
John shook his head when she waved vaguely at two stuffed chairs that sat across from the couch.  
  
"Them?" he asked.  
  
Her hands twisted together in a washing movement that reminded him of one of Rodney's old nervous habits. She closed her eyes and sighed. "The men Joseph got involved with. They're Halorian. They are not good men. They scavenge and steal, and sell things that are illegal."  
  
"Do you know names?" He asked the question cautiously, hoping she'd continue being talkative a little longer.  
  
She opened her eyes and looked over at him for a long, silent moment, her eyes so dark they were almost black. John tried not to squirm under that unsettling gaze. Finally, she seemed to come to a decision.   
  
"One of them was a man named Lime," she said. "I don't know the names of the others. I'm sorry."   
  
John asked a few more questions, but she didn't know anything more. He was about to wrap it up, but the connection between this detached woman, strong and honorable and a little eerie, and Harbin intrigued him.  
  
"Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?" John asked. At her gesture, he said, "Harbin. He's an --"  _idiot_ , he was going to say but stopped himself just in time. He tried again. "He doesn't seem the best fit for you. What did you ever see in him?"   
  
She laughed, but it was a hard sound, with rough edges and not much humor. "Halorians are started on the path as soon as they show signs of Ancient blood. My entire life, no one ever looked at me without thinking about that difference. It's lonely. Joseph looked at me and didn't just see someone different, someone on the path. He saw a person, a woman. It wasn't love."   
  
Malla closed her eyes with a sigh. "But it eased the loneliness." She looked over at him with a resigned expression.  
  
John's throat tightened and he found himself nodding.  
  
She looked at him curiously. "You are like me -- is it lonely for you, as well?"  
  
From anyone else, that would have been too nosy a question for John to touch. But he was the one who'd started with the personal questions; it was only fair. He thought for a moment, about coming to Atlantis, about finding a place to belong. He thought about Rodney and felt a smile spread over his face. "Not really."   
  
"'Not really'?"   
  
A little uncomfortable with how she'd turned the tables on him, John said, "No, I'm not lonely."  
  
Her lips tightened, her expression enigmatic. "I'm happy for you. I wish Joseph--" She took a breath. "When you catch him..."  
  
"We'll try not to hurt him," John reassured her. "It'll go easier for him if he gives himself up. If he's willing to give up the people he was working for, maybe we could make a deal."  
  
She looked thoughtful. "If I see him, I will try to convince him. I wish... Well, it doesn't matter what I wish. You have your work to return to."  
  
John reached out, but stopped before he touched her arm. "If this Lime knows you talked to me, you might be in danger. You'll probably need a guard."  
  
Malla cut him off, shaking her head. "No Halorian would ever hurt me. Those with the Ancient blood are considered sacred. Protected. I am in no danger."  
  
"Things might be a little different here, on Atlantis," John tried to argue, but she shook her head again.  
  
"No, I need no guard." Her eyes were level, calm, and she steered him to the door.  
  
He frowned, but allowed her to usher him out. "I suppose I can't force you to accept protection. If you're sure you're in no danger--"   
  
"I am sure," Malla insisted.  
  
He gave her a resigned look and paused at the door. "And, about Harbin. I am sorry."  
  
Malla nodded and for the first time sounded bitter. "He is what he is. Not the worst of men, but not wise. Too quick to take the easy way."   
  
John had just stepped out of Harbin's quarters when movement at the end of the corridor caught his eye. A man stood there, a man who took one look at John, then turned and ran.  
  
"Harbin?" John yelled after him, and took off in pursuit.   
  
John's prey was too far away to identify, but whoever it was, he was damn fast, leading John through corridor after corridor. The transporters were out of order here, just as they remained through half of Atlantis, and so they ran down stairs and ramps, deeper into Atlantis.   
  
Damage from the war was everywhere in the city, but it was especially prominent here. Lights were on the blink, charred holes covered by plastic sheets or salvaged metal, whatever materials that had been on hand when yet another wave of refugees flooded through the 'gate.   
  
People poked their heads out into the corridor, drawn by the noise. "Stop him," John yelled, but the man was too fast, slipping through the hands of a helpful bystander with ease. John nearly plowed into a little girl who wandered into his path, but stopped short just in time. He steadied her with one hand and then took off again.  
  
His calves were burning, and he was starting to regret how often he chose a warm bed and Rodney over a morning run. While the chase had started in one of the inhabited residential sections, it continued down and down, through deserted sections where the damage to the city was at its worst.   
  
The corridors here were filled with twisted metal and darkened lights. Harbin was heading down into the flooded sections of Atlantis. Dangerous and creepy, but John sure as hell wasn't turning back now.   
  
*  
  
John limped back to his quarters, trying not to shiver. He sighed in relief when he saw that Rodney wasn't home yet, since it meant that John didn't have to explain his current state quite yet. Bumping up the heat a few degrees with a thought, he sagged against the desk with a tired sigh and peeled off his filthy jacket. His wet shirt was next, and then he plodded over to the desk chair, boots squelching. He had to sit to work on the stubborn laces, tossing the wet boots into a corner, two loud thumps.  
  
It had been a humiliating end to his goose chase, falling through a broken section of flooring in the damaged section of Atlantis where the chase had taken him. The darkness had hidden a gaping hole in the decking. John had hit it just wrong and fallen through to the flooded level below. He'd splashed down into cold, murky water, deep enough that he went completely under.   
  
Disoriented and a little panicky, he'd lost track of which way was up for a frighteningly long time, the salt water burning his eyes and going up his nose. By the time he had struggled out, he was cold, wet, and bruised, and the man he had been chasing was long gone.  
  
Moving into the bathroom, John was almost afraid to look in the mirror. The reflection made him grimace. There was blood on his forehead and a swelling bruise at his hairline. Gingerly parting his hair exposed a cut, from slamming his head onto the jagged metal edge when he fell though the deck.  
  
John arched his back, kneading his lower back with the fingers of one hand. It felt like he'd pulled something there, and all of his muscles felt tight and sore. Tomorrow it'd feel even worse probably. He got into the shower, setting the water temperature hotter than normal to try to ease the aches. The pounding of the water on his back made him groan.  
  
After the shower, he popped some ibuprofen and fell into bed. He was asleep almost immediately.   
  
Rodney sliding into bed woke him up a few hours later. John made a sound, and Rodney muttered, "Sorry, sorry," and slid an apologetic hand over John's ribs. Over John's bruised, sore ribs, and he couldn't help the yelp that came out of his mouth.  
  
"What the hell?" Rodney asked, and then the lights came on. Rodney wouldn't be Rodney if there hadn't then been strident questions and covers tugged off and John's T-shirt pulled up and a grim-faced Rodney having a fit over John's bruises and scrapes. Rodney was even more irate when he heard John's abbreviated explanation of what had happened.  
  
"I thought you were through with getting hurt once we stopped going on off world missions. Why were you chasing after this guy all by yourself? And I can't believe you didn't go to the infirmary. The macho, stoic routine does not make you a sexy, sexy man, my friend."  
  
"I was tired." John tried to say more, but Rodney cut him off.  
  
"Tired? Tired? You  _moron_. Too tired to worry about a cracked skull? John.  _John_." Rodney's voice cracked on the second, urgent repetition of his name.   
  
"Rodney, easy," John said, but Rodney was still talking, his voice high and strained.  
  
"How many times,  _how_  many times have I almost lost you? I can't even count them all, and who really thought we'd win against the Wraith, and after all that, you might develop some slight sense of self-preservation."  
  
There was only one way to deal with Rodney when he got like this. John pushed him bodily back onto the bed, pinning Rodney with his weight. "Damn it, John," Rodney protested, annoyed, but not pushing John away.  
  
Mouthing Rodney's neck, John breathed in the smell of his skin. "I'm okay, Rodney. Easy. It's okay."  
  
Rodney made a sound, a bitten-off humorless laugh. "For now," he said acidly, and then the anger seemed to just drain out him. He melted beneath John, sagging back into the mattress and sighed. "For now."  
  
John kissed him, a kiss that was sloppy and wet and full of life. Rodney let out a growl and tried to pull his face away, but John persisted. Rodney finally responded, his hands gentle as they moved over John's ribs. Rodney pulled away, just enough to say, "You are such an asshole sometimes."   
  
There was more affection there than anything, and John smiled down at him. "I know."  
  
*  
  
Harbin remained elusive, but otherwise John's investigation went much better after his wild goose chase down in the damaged lower levels of Atlantis.   
  
Lorne turned up evidence connecting Harbin to the Halorian named Lime. "Electronic fund transfers," Lorne said, shoving a tablet PC into John's hands.   
  
John looked at the file displayed, raising an eyebrow at the amounts listed. "Harbin didn't place a high price on his soul, did he?" he said in a disgusted tone.  
  
Lorne shrugged, looking resigned. "It backs up the information you got from his girlfriend," he said. "Harbin was small fry. It's Lime we should be looking for."  
  
"Good work, Lorne," John said. "And I agree. We don't forget about Harbin, but let's concentrate on Lime from here on."  
  
Lime, it turned out, had his hand in many pots. They uncovered hints of a nascent business, arms shipments and drug smuggling mostly. The business was based mostly in the Genii sector, big surprise, but Lime had obviously expanded into the Atlantean sector with the drug theft from the infirmary.   
  
It wasn't just Lime working mostly solo, either; there seemed to be a whole circle of Lime's friends involved.  
  
John and his staff were working hard to firm up their evidence, when pursuing Lime became a moot point. Lime turned up dead in Genii territory.   
  
"Brodsky, we'd like to participate in one of your cases. The death of a Halorian named Lime. We think it has ties to one of our ongoing investigations," Elizabeth asked at the next joint meeting.  
  
"I'm afraid that's impossible." Brodsky's tight smile had no amusement in it, and his apologetic tone rang a little false. Brodsky started quoting the protocols at them, going on about Genii sovereignty in the Genii sector, but John didn't believe for a moment that it had anything to do with sovereignty. Brodsky was being intentionally obstructionist, and it made John fume. After the meeting, he railed at Elizabeth in frustration, but she shrugged helplessly.  
  
"Our hands are tied, John. He's within his rights, according to the treaty," she said with a tired sigh.  
  
After that, Brodsky claimed ignorance regarding the details of the case, referring John to the few available official files. John scoured the inquest report for juicy details. The gist of it seemed that Lime had been testing an Ancient device when it blew up on him. Considering Lime's history of peddling anything valuable, John read that as demonstrating an Ancient device to a potential buyer. Two of Lime's friends had dragged Lime as far as the corridor outside, where he'd then died.  
  
It all sounded a little fishy to John, but he supposed it didn't matter if Lime had been taken out by an accident or if it had been an "accident" rigged to blow up in his face by his greedy colleagues. Lime was gone, that was what mattered.  
  
He and Lorne attended Lime's death service, which was held on the mainland. It was the only line of investigation John could see still open, since Genii territory was closed to them.   
  
They took a puddle jumper over to the mainland. John headed for the pilot's seat instinctively, but then he hesitated. "You want to take her over?" he offered reluctantly. Lorne had never flown anything until he arrived in the Pegasus galaxy, but he'd taken to it instantly. John knew he enjoyed taking the jumpers out.  
  
Lorne shook his head, one corner of his mouth twitching as if suppressing a laugh. He gestured at the controls. "She's all yours."  
  
John snatched at the opportunity. Post-war, he'd gotten to fly less and less, and the loss of it was as an almost physical pang. He let out a sigh of pure pleasure as he settled into the pilot's chair and put his hands on the controls. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Lorne stifle a laugh and realized with a twinge of embarrassment that the movement of his hands on the sticks could fairly be called a caress.   
  
"Been a while?" Lorne asked. His smile, indulgent rather than mocking, made John relax a little.  
  
"Too damn long," John said with a sigh of relief. "Last time I was in a puddle jumper, I let Rodney fly."  
  
Lorne nodded. "That's good," he said, not looking over at John. "You guys. Any trouble with the new personnel?" The tone was off-hand, deliberately casual. Underneath the surface calm, though, John sensed the dangerous potential that Lorne might unleash if John answered in the affirmative.  
  
"No trouble," John said firmly as he took them out, and Lorne nodded.  
  
Lorne had known about them way back when it could still have gotten them in trouble. When John had first moved in with Rodney, Lorne hadn't said much, respecting John's own silence on the subject, but his quiet acceptance had gone a long way to smoothing things with his men.  
  
Flying them over felt great, easing the need for open sky around him that had been inside John for as long as he could remember. Sometimes he missed how things had been before the war, when he'd still gone off world, when he'd worked with Rodney almost daily, when he'd flown regularly.   
  
Of course, every day they'd been risking a horrible and terrifying death at the hands of the Wraith (and how strange was it that it was Rodney's voice in his head for that thought), but it had been worth it.   
  
 _Not even Rodney,_ John thought wryly as he brought the jumper in for the landing,  _could say I'm Captain Kirk now, that's for sure._    
  
Going from intergalactic explorer to glorified baby-sitter for hundreds of refugees might be a little bit of a comedown (and John hoped that only Heightmeyer knew that he thought of it that way), but it was a job that needed doing, and it had fallen on him to do it. No use whining over it. One of the good things about the change in his status was the semi-regular schedule that let him synchronize his off time with Rodney.  
  
When they arrived at the cemetery, John and Lorne split up, sandwiching the gravesite between them. He had always found Halorian funeral practices surprisingly unalien, with mourners gathering to inter the body into the ground. The body was wrapped in shrouds rather than encased in a coffin, and it always made John think of mummies and the old black and white horror flicks that Rodney loved.   
  
John scoped out the mourners, hoping to get a line on Lime's friends and connections. It was a gray, cold day. An ugly day for a funeral, but there was a large number of people present.  
  
Standing behind the crowd of mourners, John watched the wrapped form drop into the grave. There was a certain dark satisfaction in seeing it, but it wasn't as good as arresting Lime would have felt. It tied up a few things, although John wanted to nab some of Lime's accomplices, even Harbin, small fry that he was.  
  
He glanced across the clearing at Lorne, who had a cynical frown on his face as he eyed the crowd. He'd been sticking to John like glue after John's misadventures chasing Harbin. John sensed Rodney's influence there somewhere, probably relayed through Elizabeth so as to smooth the whole chain of command thing.   
  
A woman stood right next to the grave, shoulders heaving, her face in her hands. John watched her warily, a half-remembered story of Halorian mourners throwing themselves into the grave coming to mind, but she just stood there, sobbing.   
  
When she finally lifted her red, tear-streaked face, John eyed her curiously. Her swollen eyes and pale face made her grief obvious, and John felt his face harden.   
  
Lime didn't deserve it. It felt wrong for anyone to mourn for him that intensely. One of the kids who had died had been a war orphan with no family on Atlantis. Few of the mourners at her service had known her before she fell to the Wraith sickness. The grieving for her had been the distant, ineffectual emotion of strangers.   
  
John had attended the service, and he had felt anger and guilt, but he hadn't wept. He'd regretted it, his own failure to shed tears, but he'd felt only numbness. It was the only thing that had gotten him through Afghanistan and the Wraith war with his sanity intact, that numbness. It wasn't something he could just cast aside.  
  
A lone man, dressed in Halorian style, walked up to where John stood at the back of the crowd. Tall and gangly, he had naive features that hid nothing, and good looks starting to go to seed. He glanced at John, eyes dark in a baby round face.  
  
As if sensing John's interest, he wandered over to ask, "Could you tell me, uh. Who's the..." He gestured towards the ceremony.  
  
"A man called Lime," John said. The man's face went pale, creasing with lines of grief. John blinked at that: Lime barely deserved the grief of one mourner, much less two.   
  
The Halorian moved on, pushing his way to the front of the crowd. John kept an eye on him through the entire time, his curiosity piqued.

  
  
After the ceremony, as people scattered from the gravesite, John wandered over to the stranger. Lorne took a step towards them, but John warned him off with a look. He jerked a head toward the line of mourners headed to the large public transport headed back to Atlantis.   
  
Lorne nodded and moved off.  
  
"Need a lift back to Atlantis?" John asked the stranger. "I've got a private ship."  
  
The man eyed him warily but nodded.  
  
"My name's Sheppard," John offered as he was going through the pre-flight checks, once they were on the puddle jumper.  
  
"Martins." He had shot one mildly curious look around the jumper's interior, but settled into his chair without a word. Martins slumped there, staring down at his hands. Every now and then, he sniffed and surreptitiously dabbed at his eyes, but John saw no actual tears.  
  
Time to start digging, and John wasn't going to think about what that said about him, that he could view a man's funeral as an opportune time to ask probing questions. "You a friend of Lime?" he asked, softening his voice to a tone he hoped sounded like sympathy.   
  
Any sympathy he might have felt was buried beneath a clinical sort of curiosity.  _Was this Martins in on Lime's racket? Maybe another small fry, like Harbin?_  Because John's first impression of Martins was that he didn't seem anywhere near Lime's league of sociopathic criminal.  
  
"Yeah," Martins said. "He was the best friend I ever had."   
  
Hmm, John thought. "Been on Atlantis long?" he asked.  
  
"No," Martins said, with no deception that John could discern. Martins' clothing was pure Halorian, with no trace of the jumble of other styles that tended to develop among the refugees after they'd been on Atlantis a while. He was probably telling the truth, but John would check the gate logs anyway.  
  
John continued in that vein, asking questions of Martins during the short trip back to Atlantis. Martins was lost in thought, not really as talkative as John would have liked. After they set down in the jumper bay, he didn't have much trouble persuading Martins to have a drink in one of the cafes that had sprung up around the city when the refugees started arriving in larger numbers.   
  
While Martins' short answers on the jumper had made John think he was laconic, two drinks on John's dime were enough to loosen his tongue. Three drinks in, and Martins had gotten expansive and a little obnoxious, and John thought ruefully that Martins just would have to be an ugly drunk.  
  
"I guess nobody knew him like I did," Martins said, staring down into his glass.  
  
"How long ago?" John asked, topping off Martins' drink.  
  
"Since we were kids. I was never so lonesome in my life until he showed up," Martins said, his voice a little too loud. He had yet to mention the word  _love_  in connection to Lime, but everything about him implied it.   
  
Beneath his drunken rambling, Martins' grief seemed profound, as if Lime had been the center of his universe. The depth of that grief made John wonder if Lime had been more than just a friend. John didn't ask, however. Halorians didn't consider sex a topic for polite conversation, and it wasn't that relevant.  
  
"When the enforcers arrived, I wasn't quick enough. Lime got away, but they nabbed me. I thought he'd get tired of me always getting into trouble, but he stuck by me. He was a good guy," Martins was saying, sounding like he was on the verge of a crying jag.   
  
John listened to Martins talk, one brow raised cynically. It sounded to him like Martins had always gotten into trouble  _because_  of Lime, Lime as the charismatic manipulator pulling the strings all the while. Martins might consider that friendship, but it didn't seem like a relationship of equals to John. A touch of hero-worship, maybe, Martins as the pilot fish to Lime's shark, forever swimming in his wake.  
  
"I came because he asked me to," Martins said, his voice unsteady, when John asked him what had brought him to Atlantis. Martins seemed too naive to be in on Lime's rackets, but John wondered how long it would have taken Lime to corrupt his friend.  
  
By the time Martins hit his fourth drink, he was weepy and maudlin nearly to the point of incoherence. "He stole my girl once or twice, but I didn't mind. He made everything...fun."  _Oh, yeah, loads of fun_ , John thought. He was getting a little sick of Martins' company.   
  
John noticed that Lorne had eased his way into the cafe. The public transport had made good time. Lorne sat at an adjacent table, but Martins was too sloshed to notice the sharp focus of Lorne's gaze.   
  
"It's a shame," Martins slurred.   
  
"What?" John asked.  
  
"Him dying like that."   
  
John sighed, not bothering to hide his disgust. Lime would be a martyr by the time Martins was done with him. Maybe it was time Martins heard a few home truths about Lime, had his little hero-worship bubble burst.   
  
"Best thing that ever happened to him," John said with an edge to his voice.  
  
"What are you trying to say?" Martins asked, his hands balling into fists.   
  
"He was a criminal, a racketeer." John had to bite back the rest. If he started talking about it, he wouldn't stop, and he'd probably end up yelling, or worse, punching Martins just to shut him up.  
  
"Enforcer, huh?" Martins tried to stand, but ended up hovering above his chair.   
  
"Have another drink," John soothed, but Martins was having none of it.  
  
"I never did like the enforcers." Martins swayed there, his weight mostly on his hands, which had a white-knuckled grip on the edge of the table. "Pin it on a dead man," he said, his face red with alcohol and emotion. "Some petty racket. Just like an enforcer. Why don't you catch a few murderers for a change?"  
  
John went very still, his insides going cold. "Well, you could say that murder was part of his racket," he said, and the deceptively mild tone would only have fooled someone who didn't know him that well.  
  
Martins' fist hit the table's surface and he made an indecipherable noise like a growl. Lorne stepped forward, and Martins did a drunken dance with him, trying to move around him. Lorne shifted with him, blocking his moves easily. Lorne shot John a questioning glance.  
  
"It's all right, Lorne," John said. "Take Mr. Martins to the guest quarters."  
  
"Listen, Major Sherman, you're not going to close your files at a dead man's expense," Martins snarled.  
  
"Colonel Sheppard," John corrected. "And you're going to find me the real criminal?" he asked, casting a dubious eye at Martins' flushed face and uncertain balance.  
  
"When I'm finished with you, you'll have to leave Atlantis, you'll look so silly," Martins slurred. John sighed and when he stood, Martins went for a punch.  
  
The move was clumsy, and Lorne deflected him again. Martins tried one last time to swing on John, but Lorne had him subdued in a second with one of the moves that Ronon had shown them way back when. "Easy there, Martins," Lorne said, his tone almost friendly although his grip on Martins' arm didn't waver.  
  
"Thanks," John said to Lorne, the memory of Ronon turning John's voice rough. "Take him to his quarters. Make sure he behaves."  
  
John turned to Martins. "You said you came here from one of the resettlement planets. I'd suggest you return there, Martins. Next gate activation, preferably." Martins might be in the clear with regards to Lime's rackets, but he was someone who didn't choose his friends wisely. He'd probably gravitate towards Lime's associates, maybe get in over his head, and that was something John could do without.  
  
Martins' hands curled into fists again at that, but Lorne did something subtle with his grip on Martins' elbow that made the Halorian wilt. Lorne rolled his eyes at John and steered him towards the door. "This way, Martins."  
  
As Lorne ushered Martins out of the cafe, John stared at Martins' back.  _He's going to be trouble_ , John thought and sighed.  
  
*  
  
Rodney came in late again that night, waking John up from a sound sleep. He sat up, the book he'd been reading sliding off his chest.   
  
"It's late," he said stupidly, groggy still, and turned on the light.  
  
"Hmm," Rodney said, pulling off his jacket and tossing his headset onto the desk. "You can tell time. Gold star for you."  
  
"The repairs?" John asked, and when Rodney didn't reply, "It's going to take time, Rodney. Don't do this again. Your heart can't take this. You'll kill yourself trying to put Atlantis back the way she was--"  
  
Rodney cut him off, his expression shuttered. "John, shut up. That's not it, okay?"  
  
"Okay," he said slowly, running a hand through his hair. He cast about for something else to talk about. "It was Lime's funeral today. Lorne and I went as part of the investigation. I hate funerals."   
  
Rodney looked up from pulling off his boots. "Don't we all. I wonder why?" He sounded sharp and prickly, and John remembered it had been Rodney's Heightmeyer appointment today.   
  
"You okay?" John asked, a little tentative. Even after all this time, there were subjects they only approached cautiously, sniffing the air and circling like a couple of dogs.   
  
Rodney dropped his boot and fell back onto the bed, still mostly dressed. He closed his eyes and turned his face into John's side, his breath warm and damp against John's ribs. "Sorry," he said finally. "Bad day. Really bad day."  
  
John put the book on the bedside table and reached over to grab Rodney's hand, hard enough to hurt. Rodney didn't flinch. He stayed quiet for way too long, and John knew Heightmeyer had pushed him hard. They'd all lost the luxury of kid gloves regarding their states of mental health a long time ago.  
  
"What do you need?" John said, soft enough Rodney could pretend to ignore it.  
  
Rodney buried his face in John's chest and didn't look up. His voice was almost inaudible. "Nothing. I don't need anything."  
  
He looked down at Rodney. "Liar," he muttered. "How was your appointment?" he asked, treading carefully again. He didn't like talking about the serious crap either, but he'd go there if he had to.   
  
Rodney hadn't responded, and John poked him. Rodney batted the hand away, not looking up. "It wasn't the appointment," he said at last. "It was after."  
  
John waited a beat, but nothing more was forthcoming. "What was after?"  
  
Rodney's shoulders heaved in a deep sigh. "Today I cleaned out Radek's lab. Finally. She's been on me to do it since forever, practically."  
  
"Jesus, Rodney." John didn't know what to say after that and hoped Heightmeyer's tough love thing didn't backfire. He knew from personal experience just how hard Heightmeyer could be when it was required, but making Rodney deal with Zelenka's lab seemed cold.  
  
He felt Rodney's hand move under his shirt, Rodney's fingers chilly and clumsy against John's stomach. He sucked in a breath.  
  
Rodney's words were muffled against John's chest. "I need you to fuck me."  
  
John didn't say anything for a moment, and Rodney continued, "I don't want to think anymore right now. Think we can manage that?"  
  
"We can do that," John said.  
  
Rodney was quiet when John slid into him, the little catches in his breath the only signs of what they were doing. John fucked him hard and fast, just on the edge of rough, slamming into the sweet spot on every stroke. Rodney was making choked little sounds, which John had thought meant pain the first time he'd heard them. He knew better now, and kept up the pounding rhythm.  
  
"Fucking my brains out," Rodney had called it once, and John usually didn't like it quite so fast, but it was what Rodney needed tonight. No time to think, just feel, washing away everything in a white-out of sensation.  
  
Rodney came with a sob well before John's orgasm struck him. He stayed inside Rodney and stroked his sides, trying to soothe him with little caresses over his ribs, before he finally pulled out. Afterwards, John noticed that Rodney's cheeks were wet, but he didn't say anything about it.  
  
*  
  
John had almost forgotten about Martins when the Halorian turned up right in the middle of trouble, just as John had predicted.  
  
"Brodsky's in our sector, searching someone's quarters," Lorne reported over John's headset.  
  
John got the call in the mess, where he had managed to grab lunch with Rodney.   
  
"Have to go," he said, pushing his chair back with a frown. "Sorry. Brodsky's stirring up trouble."  
  
"Work," Rodney said, his tone philosophical. He shrugged, reaching over to snag John's pie.  
  
"Hey," John protested. "I could've taken that with me." He reached over to snatch the plate back, but Rodney slapped his hand away.   
  
"Oh, please. You'd cut a fine figure knocking that Genii asshole down a peg or two while stuffing your face with pie," Rodney said from the corner of his mouth not occupied by chewing.   
  
Rodney was obviously in a much better mood today. John took a moment to watch him, taking in the sight of Rodney chewing his food with gusto. Rodney's downcast eyes made his lashes more obvious, and John felt a rush of heat, sudden lust, powerful and inconveniently timed. An image took over his brain, a fantasy of fucking Rodney on the table in the middle of the mess, shoving plates and silverware to the floor with a crash.   
  
Rodney looked up and caught him at it. Something must have shown on his face, because Rodney's blue eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed as Rodney smiled up at him, a knowing smirk of a smile.  _I know what you're thinking_ , it said.   
  
"Yeah." John realized he'd said that aloud, and Rodney's smirk deepened, and he licked meat sauce from his forefinger with obvious intent, although it came off more sloppy than provocative.   
  
Rodney's blunt instrument style of flirting was only half serious, but John felt heat rising in his face even as he laughed. He paused, taking a few more seconds he couldn't really afford. Brodsky and his men worked fast, pushing the limits of the treaty protocols at every chance. Give the Genii an inch, and they'd take the proverbial mile.   
  
Rodney's smirk smoothed away, although his gaze lost none of its heat. "Go, go," he said, flapping a hand at John. "I need to get back to the repairs, anyway. I'll see you tonight."  
  
The erotic significance of Rodney's words was obvious, and John left the mess with a flush heating his face. Contemplating the Genii on the walk over was enough to kill all traces of arousal.   
  
John found himself in one of more ornate of the residential sections. The quarters here had tall ceilings and loads of stained glass and all the strange art deco touches that the Ancients had loved. The section also happened to be one of the most damaged, so all the luxury had a surreal, decayed feel. The stained glass was shattered, the ceilings cracked, and there was no response to John's mental commands. He suppressed a shudder. Rodney and his staff had managed basic utilities, but anything more was low on the list right now.  
  
When John showed up, Brodsky was tearing the place apart. "Her identification is not in order," Brodsky said, when John tried to stop the search process.  
  
"That's Atlantean business," John protested. "She's in our sector, Brodsky. You're pushing me, my friend."  
  
"My  _friend_ ," Brodsky sneered the word, "you know nothing. She is Genii, living in your sector illegally. Not Halorian, as her identification states. Any Genii on Atlantis is under my control, not yours."  
  
"Genii?" John asked, startled in spite of himself. "How--"   
  
Brodsky cut him off. "Her identification codes are forged. We will find evidence, and then we will take her back."  
  
Just then, there was a commotion at the door to the quarters, Brodsky's men detaining two people who were trying to enter.   
  
"I live here; please let me in." That came from the woman, presumably the Anna Schmidt listed as occupying the quarters. Following her into the quarters was Martins, the troublesome bad penny of a Halorian. John stifled a sigh. Martins had obviously decided to stick around Atlantis in defiance of John's suggestion. And the Halorian had found himself some companionship.  
  
"Getting around, Martins?" John asked, eyeing the woman at Martins' side.  
  
Martins' lip curled as the barbed comment struck home. Gesturing at the search going on around them, he glared at John. "Oh, pinning things on girls now?"  
  
Glancing at the woman again, John realized he'd last seen Anna Schmidt crying her eyes out at Lime's funeral. She wasn't crying now, although she stared at him with the lost, broken eyes of someone sincerely in mourning. All that emotion wasted on pond scum; John didn't think much of her taste in men.  
  
Martins came up behind her, his hand sliding down around her waist, too close and a little possessive, like an attentive suitor. John wondered darkly how much of it was real and how much just part of his seduction technique.  
  
Lime's girlfriend and Lime's oldest friend -- wasn't that just a dysfunctional match made in hell. They could fuck, each of them thinking of someone else, and neither worry about calling out a dead man's name. Convenient.  
  
John turned to Schmidt, trying to keep the cynical thoughts off his face. "I'd like to see your identification, please," he asked.   
  
Brodsky could claim what he wanted; John would check her identification himself. They both ignored Martins' interruption, "Don't give him anything."  
  
She placed the data disk into his waiting palm. He thanked her, and shoved it into the slot of his PDA. Numbers scrolled across the screen. It took a few seconds, but the correlation algorithm came up empty. Her codes matched nothing in the database; the disk was most certainly a forgery. Schmidt was Genii.  
  
"How much did you pay for this?" he asked gently.   
  
Martins stepped between them. "Sheppard, this search is pointless. Anna's done nothing wrong. Stop harassing her."  
  
John's eyebrow went up at that, but he managed to keep a neutral expression in the face of Martins' belligerence.   
  
"Brodsky claims she's Genii," he drawled after a moment. "Says her identification is forged." John held up the PDA. "This says he's probably right. According to the treaty protocols, Brodsky has the right to an investigation." He shrugged, and Martins' face flushed bright red.  
  
"It's a lie. This is wrong, Sheppard." Martins turned to Schmidt. "It's not true, is it, Anna? Your identification is in order."  
  
She'd gone pale, her hand at her throat. "Don't make a fuss," she whispered.  
  
Having no luck with her, Martins turned on John again. "I suppose it wouldn't interest you to know that Lime was murdered? You're too busy. You haven't bothered to get the complete evidence."  
  
"How so?" John said, not bothering to hide his skepticism.  
  
"Somehow everyone around him the night he died was a friend of his. That's kind of weird, don't you think?"  
  
"Not really," John said, shaking his head. "Lime seemed to collect friends who were as crooked as he was. My guess is that they were all in on whatever dirty deal he had going down that night."  
  
Martins heaved out an ostentatious sigh, as if he was exercising great patience, and John felt like punching the man. Martins said, "And there was a third man there. The inquest report stated Lime was with two friends that night, Kurtz and Popescu. Two men who dragged him out into the corridor. But I've got a witness who saw three. Kurtz and Popescu lied at the inquest, lied to cover up a murder."  
  
John felt his shoulders slump. Who did Martins think he was, Sam Spade? The unflagging belief in his murderous dead friend, his dogged earnestness, his naive meddling -- it all made John feel tired and old.  
  
"Maybe your witness doesn't know what he's talking about. Or maybe Lime's friends lied to cover for someone who didn't want to be associated with a dead racketeer. It doesn't matter. I don't care how he died, Martins. The only important thing is that he's dead," John snapped. Schmidt flinched at his words, and John felt a twinge of shame. "I'm sorry," he said to her.  
  
"Tactful, too, aren't we, Sherman?" Martins sneered.   
  
"Sheppard," John corrected through tight lips.  
  
Martins continued. "I tell you a third man was there. The witness Malla found--"  
  
John grabbed Martins' arm, just above the elbow. "Wait, who?"  
  
Martins tried to pull his arm from John's grip but John just clamped down harder. Martins swallowed and said, "Malla. She's one of the Others." The capitalization was obvious from the way Martins spoke.   
  
"I know who she is," John said, though clenched teeth. The distaste on Martins' face made John tighten his grip. Martins pulled at John's grip again and let out a pained sound when he couldn't get free.   
  
John finally released him with a warning shake, and Martins contined, "The Others -- they  _know_  things sometimes. Spooky."  
  
At John's impatient gesture, Martins looked offended. John could feel a tight frown creasing his face, and when Martins glanced over, his eyes went a little wide at whatever he saw there.   
  
Martins continued, sounding a little wary. "She contacted Anna, wanted to talk about a witness she'd found, someone who saw a third man there that night. Kurtz, Popescu, and someone else. She's interested in figuring out what really happened, too. Unlike you."  
  
He ignored Martins' accusing tone, kicking himself. He should have insisted Malla take the protection he'd offered her. He'd started her off down this path with his questions. She'd been in danger from the moment she talked to him, and once she started talking to Martins and Schmidt, investigating on her own, she'd made herself a big fat target.  
  
"Don't get her tangled up in your delusions, Martins," he warned. "You can play amateur detective all you want, but don't involve her in it. You don't know what you're mixing in."  
  
"As soon as I get to the bottom of this, I'll get the next 'gate activation," Martins said, a defiant look on his face.  
  
"Death's at the bottom of everything, Martins," John said tiredly and turned away, distracted by movement at the entrance of Schmidt's quarters.  
  
Brodsky's men were escorting her out into the corridor, and John turned to the Genii. "One of my men will be present for the interrogation," John said. "And we'll be reviewing all the evidence you collected here. It's in the protocols," he added, trying to block any potential protests on Brodsky's part.   
  
Brodsky nodded, so John pushed him a little. "And she comes back to the Atlantean sector as soon as you've questioned her."  
  
"Of course, Colonel Sheppard." Brodsky was being too cooperative. John felt his spirits sink a little; Brodsky must be damn confident.   
  
Brodsky said, "We will follow the protocols. Once we have our evidence, I will go before the joint committee to request her repatriation," Brodsky said with a smile. It wasn't a pleasant expression, and it made John grimace. The Genii wouldn't look kindly on her.  
  
"Must you?" She was pleading with one of Brodsky's men, who was tagging a box of letters for evidence collection. "Those are from him. It's all I have."  
  
John frowned. He didn't particularly want to feel sympathetic towards any of Lime's circle, but it was happening anyway. The pain was buried down beneath her dead expression, but it was there in her eyes. It made John feel for her loss in a way that none of Martins' maudlin stories had.  
  
Martins was promising her that he'd get things sorted out. She glanced over at Brodsky's implacable face, and then shot Martins a disbelieving glance. "Sometimes he said I laughed too much," she said, as Brodsky's men led her away.  
  
John somehow didn't think that'd be much of a problem now.  
  
*  
  
Malla was nowhere to be found. John didn't like it; he couldn't send in a security team to guard her if he couldn't locate her in the first place.   
  
"She's probably in the Genii sector," Lorne suggested at one point.   
  
John nodded reluctantly. "Martins said that's where he saw her last. I asked for Brodsky's help, but you know what that's like."  
  
They got their answer as to Malla's whereabouts when Martins limped into John's office the next day. He reeked; from the smell he'd been stoking his courage with the clear liquor John thought of as Athosian moonshine.   
  
"The Genii are after me for murder. I didn't do it," Martins said, slumping into a chair. His clothes were torn and filthy, and dark circles under his eyes stood out against his pale skin.  
  
John went cold. "Malla," he said, somehow certain of it, the ache already in his throat.  
  
Martins flinched. "And her witness. News travels fast."   
  
"I didn't know until just now," John said. His voice sounded odd, flat and dead. "I told you to go away, Martins. Now you've gotten two people killed."   
  
Part of him realized it wasn't entirely fair to put it all on Martins; he himself deserved some of the blame. He should have insisted Malla accept protection, should have known that her special status as a gene-carrier wouldn't be enough to keep her safe. Not once he'd attracted the worst sort of attention to her by questioning her. The guilt lodged in his gut, made him restless, wanting to strike out at someone.   
  
John's voice was icy when he spoke. "You've been playing around with the worst bunch of criminals in Atlantis. Your wonderful Lime's friends, and now you're wanted for murder."   
  
"You must know I didn't do it," he said, looking at John with hunted eyes.   
  
John blew out an impatient sigh. "I know you didn't kill anyone, but the Genii don't particularly care what I believe. You're a fool, Martins," he said grimly, eyeing Martins' face, still a little puffy and red from the alcohol.   
  
He made John think of a guy he'd known in flight school, who'd never gotten beyond the binge-drinking, party-animal ways of his college years. He was the perennial frat boy, permanently immature. It had gotten him kicked out of the program, and he'd come to John to complain about it. He'd stood there; the hurt and confusion on his face made John want to punch him.  _Don't you get it_ , John'd felt like snarling.  _We all have to grow up some time._  Instead, he'd said, "Hey, bad luck, man," in the same genial tone that he used to cover all the bases of emotion.  
  
Martins stared at him for a moment, his mouth twisted into an expression that was suspiciously close to a pout. "I'm only a little fool. I'm an amateur at it. You're a professional," he said. He was angry, his face flushed.   
  
It wasn't the first time John had been called a professional fuck up, but this time he probably deserved it more than when he'd heard it from his commanding officer. He shook his head and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, pressing hard enough that he saw stars. Letting his hands drop, he tugged his laptop over to pull up the relevant files. He pushed the laptop over so that Martins could view the screen. Then he reached down to pull open his special desk drawer, the one with the good scotch.   
  
"What are you doing?" Martins asked. When John set the bottle and a glass on the desk, Martins said, "I don't need your drinks, Sheppard."  
  
"You will," John promised. "I don't want another murder in this case, and you were born to be murdered. So you're going to hear the facts."  
  
"You haven't told me a single one yet," Martins protested.  
  
"You know there's a treatment for the Wraith sickness?" John asked. At Martins' wary nod, John continued. "There was a shortage in the treatment drugs, and people started getting panicky. Someone decided to capitalize on that panic. They stole the drugs from the infirmary, left us with tap water to treat all of our patients."  
  
Martins' folded his arms across his chest. "Are you too busy chasing after some drugs to investigate a murder?"  
  
A tic started up under John's right eye. He pressed at the eye socket to try to ease it with no luck. "These  _were_  murders. A dozen patients received water instead of medicine. Ten kids died. Some of them were Halorian kids. Your people, Martins. And Lime's. That was the racket Lime organized."  
  
Martins' leaned back in his chair, and his arms stayed crossed across his chest, his body language defensive. "Sheppard, you haven't shown me one shred of evidence."  
  
John patted the laptop. "It's all in here. You can see everything we've got on Lime."  
  
It took a while. By the time John had shown Martins the last of the Lime files, Martins was looking shaky and pale. He seemed completely stunned, as if someone had pulled the rug from under his feet, and John supposed he couldn't really blame the man. Martins was facing the end of twenty years of friendship, his every memory tainted with what sort of man Lime really was.  
  
John felt for him, just a little. It was tough to have your beliefs overturned, to be forced to rethink the way the world worked. He knew the feeling all too well.  _Join the club_ , he thought a little bitterly.   
  
"How could he have done it?" Martins said, his eyes closed.  
  
"A hundred bucks a vial," John murmured. He tried to sound sympathetic, but he couldn't quite manage it. "Go back to the guest quarters and try to stay out of trouble. I'll try to fix things with the Genii, but I can't be responsible for you if you leave the Atlantean sector."  
  
Martins stood slowly, as if he'd aged twenty years in an hour. "I'm not asking you to." He sounded defeated, his innocence gone.   
  
"I'm sorry, Martins," John said.  
  
Pausing at the door to John's office, Martins said, "I'm sorry, too."   
  
*  
  
After talking to Martins, he went running to clear his head. He was thinking about Martins and Malla and Lime, and was so lost in thought that he forget and ran his old route, making the turn out onto Pier 4. It had always made a nice change from the chill of the city's interior, a half-mile detour into sun and sea air.   
  
It was the border to Genii territory now; he'd changed his running route to avoid it. He stopped short at the sight of the checkpoint, manned by Genii guards. They stood in the shade of one of the towers, all shiny boots and crisp olive-green uniforms, rifle butts resting on the deck. It was a weird shock, the start of the Genii invasion -- sorry,  _joint occupation_  -- all over again, seeing armed Genii on  _his_  pier, in  _his_  city. It made him think of things he'd rather forget, raising his hackles, and he instinctively reached for the sidearm that was locked up in his desk drawer at work.  
  
One guard shifted her weapon and stared right through him, aware of him but not particularly alarmed by his antics.  
  
"Shit," he muttered, a little shaken at his own reaction. He had to breathe in and out deliberately for a few minutes before the adrenaline stopped pumping.   
  
The run didn't do much to help him unwind, and he hunted down Teyla after that.   
  
"John, how are you?" she asked with a surprised smile that lightened her somber expression. She said nothing about the tension in his voice when he asked for a sparring session, but her eyes on him were a little too understanding.   
  
He felt a twinge of guilt; he'd been neglecting their friendship recently. Even if they never again went through the 'gate shoulder to shoulder, she would always be one of his team, his friend. Her calm reserve had been part of her for as long as John had known her, but the loss of Ronon had driven her even more inside herself. He promised himself to spend more time with her, to start sparring regularly again.  
  
She gave him a punishing workout that forced him to concentrate, finally taming his contrary brain. He blocked and blocked again, but she easily disarmed him at one point, sticks flying. He ended up on his back, Teyla straddling his chest, which should've been kind of hot, he thought a little wistfully. Except that it was  _Teyla_ , and he  _hurt_ , and over time his body had become imprinted on prickly, male, broad-shouldered Rodney for what tripped his trigger.   
  
Her eyes sought his, her expression hard. "Do you yield?"  
  
The breath had been knocked out of him, and her sticks were crossed at his throat. He could only wheeze, but he managed to tap the mat. She smiled and nodded and then helped him up with a strong, calloused hand.  
  
"Again?" she asked with one brow raised.  
  
Leaning over with his hands on his knees, he managed to catch a breath. He glanced at his watch and shook his head. "Sorry. I'll be late."  
  
Her expression softened, her smile indulgent. "Rodney?"  
  
"Yeah." His smile was embarrassingly dopey; he could just feel it. She looked wistful as she jerked a nod at the door.   
  
"Go, then," she said.  
  
"You could have dinner with us," he offered, feeling awkward.  
  
"I would not intrude," she said gently. She held up her hand as he tried to speak again. "I must return to the mainland anyway. But thank you for the offer."  
  
John walked back to his quarters, moving gingerly, breathless, and a little buzzed on endorphins. He felt disconnected and shaky, but it had been exactly what he needed. He hurried to clean up.   
  
Rodney smiled when John slid into his seat, hair still wet from his shower.   
  
"You're dripping," Rodney said, reaching over to trace a line in front of John's ear. Old instincts died hard, but John managed not to flinch away from the touch. He couldn't stop his uneasy glance at the tables around them, but no one was paying them the slightest attention.  
  
There was no real reason to be circumspect anymore, not since the international codes were adopted by the military. The Wraith war had meant an increasing international influence on the American forces, and the Wraith threat made trivial any shit about who a soldier wanted to fuck. John knew all that theoretically, but old instincts didn't just fade away. He'd probably never be easy with public displays.  
  
Rodney caught him scanning the room, and John shrugged a little guiltily. "Sorry."  
  
Rodney waved it off. "Oh, please. At least I don't have to sit on my hands anymore."  
  
"You just suck at lying," John laughed, but it was relief more than anything. It hadn't been easy on either of them, pretending, pretending when the other was hurt or held hostage, hands to yourself, and nobody ever knowing that two squabbling friends were more than friends. John might be an expert at it -- he'd spent his life pretending, to his father, to his commanders -- but it never got any easier.   
  
"Keeping it secret for so long -- it used to make me sweat, thinking about screwing this up," Rodney said, a shadow crossing his face. "Maybe you haven't noticed, but I tend to broadcast my state of mind. Loudly," he said, going for humor, but his eyes didn't brighten.   
  
"No, really?" John asked in a dry voice. He made himself make the move, reaching over to adjust the collar of Rodney's jacket, letting the back of his finger press into the soft skin of Rodney's neck.  
  
Rodney took in a sharp breath through his nose, a flush reddening his cheeks.   
  
"Your collar. It was twisted," John lied, the habit as old and familiar as a broken-in pair of boots.   
  
"No, it wasn't," Rodney said, his voice a little high, his eyes catching John's.  
  
John smiled. "You're right. It wasn't," he agreed. He looked down at his plate and made himself say it, not looking up. "You suck at lying. I'm a little too good at it."   
  
Rodney shrugged, moving his foot over to nudge John's. "You're working on it," he said, his tone indulgent, and then went back to his food.   
  
John watched him tear into his meatloaf, making little noises. Rodney ate with gusto, the same way he approached sex, and John suddenly couldn't get that image out of his head, sex with Rodney, sweat and heat and noises like the ones Rodney was making now. He shifted uncomfortably in his chair as his clothes suddenly felt too tight.   
  
Noticing his fidgeting, Rodney did a double take. "Is watching me eat turning you on, Sheppard?" he asked, his surprise obvious by his lack of volume control.  
  
John winced, willing himself not to blush. "Jesus, Rodney, could you say that a little louder? I'd rather not have intimate details announced to everyone in the mess."   
  
Rodney shoved his food into one cheek, talking out of the other side of his mouth. "Very nice, but didn't we just agree that delicate subtlety is not a part of my personality?"   
  
"I guess we did." John shrugged. He shifted in his chair again. "Um. You done, yet?"  
  
Rodney stopped chewing and put down his fork. He blinked at John's expression, and then flushed a little, his eyes widening. "I could be." After John shot him a look, he said, "Yeah, all right. I'm done."  
  
John rushed them along back to their quarters. "Come on, come on," he growled.   
  
Rodney laughed, sounding pleased, his ears pink. The instant the door closed behind them, Rodney shoved him against a wall, tugged John's pants down, and took care of the immediate problem with a big, practiced hand. Afterwards, John reached over, but Rodney was only a little hard.   
  
"Later," Rodney said unperturbed. He was already talking about his day as he absently tucked John away, zipping him up with an affectionate pat. John flopped on the bed and let Rodney's voice flow over him: Rodney's brilliant fix to some system, the breaking in of the newest engineers SGC had sent.  
  
It used to bug him, early on, when they were out of synch like that, but he'd figured out by now that it didn't mean much. It just happened like that sometimes, Rodney humming along on a slow burn, while John went up like a firecracker. Rodney'd be raring to go later, and John could have twice the fun.  
  
"And how was your day?" Rodney asked finally, his mocking tone covering his self-consciousness. They had never really gotten the hang of domesticity, what Rodney called the 'honey, I'm home thing,' without a good dose of irony to go along with it. John had always given them a pass on it; they were pretty damn good at the non-verbal parts of being together.  
  
He told Rodney a little about the Martins case, about Malla. Rodney's eyes flickered over John's face when he spoke of Malla's murder. The tilt of Rodney's mouth showed distress, and he was quiet after that, which surprised John. He'd thought Rodney would be on his case about feeling guilty, but Rodney just looked thoughtful and a little sad.  
  
He fell asleep while Rodney was in the shower. He'd meant to stay awake, arousal still thrumming his blood a little, thinking about Rodney soapy and wet. Thoughts of sex lost to fatigue, though, as the run and sparring session caught up with him.   
  
John was sound asleep when the emergency call woke him up. Fumbling on the bedside table, he finally found his headset and slipped it on. It was Lorne. "Sorry, sir, but I just got a weird call from Martins. He's claiming Lime's still alive, that he saw him outside Anna Schmidt's quarters. You want me to check it out first?"  
  
John rubbed the sleep from his eyes and grumbled under his breath. "No, I got it. I'm going."  
  
Lorne said, "I'm coming with you. We've already had two people killed over this; you'll need backup."  
  
John didn't bother protesting. "I'll swing by your office, soon as I'm dressed." He signed off, and then forced himself to move, feeling sluggish and sleepy still.  
  
"Damn it," he muttered, easing out from under Rodney's arm. Rodney mumbled something, still mostly asleep.  
  
"Shh. Go back to sleep," John whispered, running a hand over Rodney's shoulder. "Everything's okay. I have to go."  
  
John dressed and swung by to meet up with Lorne, before heading out to Schmidt's quarters. Martins met them there. John shot him an irritated glance; the Halorian looked wild-eyed and smelled faintly of alcohol. His story certainly sounded like the ravings of a drunk.   
  
"Well?" he asked impatiently. If Martins had rousted him out of a warm bed for a hallucination, John was going to strangle the man.  
  
"This way." Martins led them down the corridor, until they ended up in one of the still-deserted and damaged sections of Atlantis. "This is where he vanished."  
  
They eyed the corridor, empty and dark, panels half-hanging from the walls. Lorne met John's eyes, one of his eyebrows raised skeptically. John shrugged.  
  
"Uh-huh," John grunted.  
  
Martins stood there, his balance precariously shifting from foot to foot. His gaze went from the corridor in front of them to John's face. "You don't believe me."  
  
John smiled his best shark smile, lots of teeth, and let an edge bleed into his voice. "Afraid not," he said.  
  
"You don't think I'm blind do you?" Martins asked, his voice rising. John didn't bother to answer that. They moved into the corridor, and Martins stumbled a few steps farther, until he lurched to a stop, his arms wind-milling wildly. "Whoa," he said, and Lorne reached to steady the man.  
  
"Martins, what the hell?" John asked irritably, and stepped forward -- and almost fell through the damaged section of flooring that had nearly claimed Martins. John flashed on another hole that he'd fallen through, during his chase after Joseph Harbin.   
  
He knelt by the opening, trying to peer down into the darkness. He hadn't worn his vest, but Lorne was prepared, handing over a flashlight. "Thanks. Grab my legs," he said. With Lorne's strong grip anchoring him, he dropped head-first into the opening to take a better look.   
  
Flashing the light around, he sniffed; the iodine smell of stale seawater was strong here, although the corridor below looked mostly dry. Something glinted as he moved the flashlight around, small puddles dotting the deck -- and regularly spaced wet spots that John realized were footprints. They led down the corridor for as far as John could see.   
  
It was a perfect escape route for a dead man. He said as much to Lorne, after he was topside again.  
  
John glanced at Martins, expecting smugness, but not finding it. Martins looked shaken instead, rocked by his friend's resurrection.  
  
"Huh," Lorne said. "It wasn't the Halorian gin, after all."  
  
John frowned, thinking of Lime's funeral, wondering who'd been wrapped in the burial shrouds that cold, gray day. They'd trusted the identification provided by the Genii inquest. They'd trusted the Genii. They really, really should know better than that by now. "We should have dug deeper than the grave," he muttered.  
  
*

  
Joseph Harbin. That was who had been buried in Lime's grave, and the rising death toll was enough to make John's teeth clench, a cold anger rising in him. Harbin might have been a weak and greedy little shit, but he didn't deserve to be murdered. Malla had been completely innocent in a way that Harbin had not been; she'd deserved her fate even less.   
  
Lime was the cause of this, and John was almost glad that he was still alive. It meant he could be made to pay. John was going to get his hands on the man, and Lime was going to pay. Pay for the people who were dead from his drug racket, for two kids who were as good as dead. Pay for Harbin. For Malla.  
  
But how to get to Lime? What did Lime care about, if he cared about anything at all?  
  
 _Anna Schmidt. Anna Schmidt and Martins._  If Lime felt anything, it'd be for those two. John smiled, a grim twist of his lips. His skin felt stretched taut and thin, and he knew his expression was too grim to really be called a smile.  
  
"Lorne," John said. "Send a security team to go pick up Anna Schmidt. And make sure she's here just before the meeting with Brodsky starts."  
  
Lorne paused, his face carefully blank. "Sir?" he said a little warily.   
  
"Trust me," John said. Lorne's eyes stayed on him, and whatever he saw in John's face made him frown, made his eyes go troubled. "Trust me," John repeated, jerking a nod towards the door.   
  
As John had instructed, they brought her in a few minutes before John's meeting with Brodsky. She hesitated at John's open door.  
  
He waved her in. "Come in. I'm not interested in your forged identification. That's a Genii matter. When did you last see Lime?"  
  
"Two weeks ago." Schmidt's expression was remote, unruffled.   
  
John couldn't tell if she was lying or not. Her face was smooth, almost like a doll's. Only the tiny lines around her eyes and mouth revealed the signs of stress and age. Her eyes were guileless and blue, reminding him of Rodney's. His throat felt tight when he spoke. "I want the truth. We know he's alive."  
  
The proud line of his shoulders slumped a little. "It is true, then," she said. She'd heard the news before John had told her. But she and Martins were cozy enough that she could have gotten her information from him.   
  
Of course, the traces of uncertainty she'd shown so far could be an act. She might have known all along, which would work to John's advantage. The fewer secrets Lime kept from her, the better for John, if he could just get her to talk.  
  
"Joseph Harbin's body was found in the grave." He said it fast, his words hard, as he watched for her reaction.  
  
Schmidt blinked, her eyes as blank as a blind person's. "What did you say? I'm sorry."  
  
"I said another man was buried in his place," John said, frowning at her dazed expression. She seemed only half here, the rest of her adrift, unreachable. He wondered if she was drunk, although he smelled nothing on her breath.   
  
"Where is he?" she said, with a sudden light to her eyes. Hope, John realized, and felt his own shoulders slump a little. Either she was a superb actress, or she'd really believed Lime was dead. Still, she knew Lime well, well enough to know where he might hole up when he was in trouble.  
  
"That's what we want to find out." John tried to stay patient. Anger would probably push her further into her little dream world.  
  
She was silent for a second, her brow furrowing. "I'm sorry. I don't seem to be able to understand anything you say. He is alive. Now, this minute, he is doing something." Her voice was filled with wonder, and John was sure now that she hadn't known.  
  
A trace of John's impatience crept into his voice. "We know he's somewhere in the Genii sector. You may as well help us."   
  
At that moment, Lorne led Brodsky into the conference room adjacent to John's office. The glass walls between them hid nothing, and he watched Schmidt's face freeze as she caught sight of the Genii.  
  
"Yes, we know you're Genii. That's Colonel Brodsky. He wants you back, but we don't have to accommodate him. Now tell me where Lime is."   
  
If Brodsky really wanted her, John couldn't do much to help her without trading in some big favors, but she didn't know that. It was ugly, the worst sort of manipulation. John was a little ashamed of himself, using tactics like that, but if the Pegasus galaxy had taught them anything, it was that sometimes you had to get a little dirty to get things done.   
  
"I don't know," she said, her voice bright and hard as light in vacuum, devoid of emotion.   
  
He'd lost her. Somehow he'd lost her, pushed her deep into that detached place in her head, to where even the threat of Brodsky failed to move her. Then he realized she wasn't drunk. Not drunk at all. She just didn't give a shit anymore, and John knew all too well how dangerous someone like that could be.  
  
"If you help me, I am prepared to help you, Anna Schmidt," he said. It was a throw away line, because he already knew he'd failed.  
  
Her sad blue eyes roamed over his face. There was finally a trace of emotion in her face, contempt, a faint sneer on her lips. "Martins always said you were a fool."  
  
John frowned and tried one last time. "With the stargate on lockdown, Atlantis is a closed city. He can't get away." Let her get that information to her lover. Lime was trapped like a rat; he could stew on that for a while.   
  
He led her to the door, but Schmidt paused, managing to get in the last word. "Poor man," she said in a toneless voice. "I wish he were dead. He would be safe from all of you then."  
  
*  
  
His meeting with Brodsky was not what anyone could call productive. Afterwards, John was convinced that the Genii was stone walling. Brodsky claimed to know nothing about how Harbin's body came to be identified as Lime's. It was a pretty sure thing that he could count on no Genii help apprehending Lime, what with Lime's influence stretching so far into the Genii sector.  
  
"The Genii are up to something," he said in Elizabeth's office. "They're harboring a criminal."  
  
"The Lime business," she said, looking troubled. She leaned back in her chair, twirling a pencil thoughtfully in one hand.  
  
"Lime's in deep with the Genii. The 'mixup' with Harbin could be just the tip of the iceberg."  
  
Elizabeth frowned, massaging her temple with her free hand. "John, the Genii have protested that you're interfering with their autonomy. Poking your nose into their business, throwing accusations around. Stirring up trouble."  
  
He started pacing, stalking the length of her office while she looked on silently. "That's ridiculous," he said, proud that he sounded calm.  
  
She sighed. "I know that. You know that. SGC doesn't know that. They look at your history with the Genii and think you've got 'unresolved issues,' I believe was the phrase used. They don't like what they're hearing. They don't want trouble."  
  
He stopped, his back to her. "Are you telling me to back off?" he asked stiffly, staring at the intricate grain in the polished wooden bowl that sat on one of her shelves.  
  
"Don't be ridiculous," she snapped. "I'm warning you, John. Be careful with Brodsky. He's a treacherous bastard."  
  
John turned around, schooling his expression into a bland mask. "I'm learning that, believe me."   
  
He eyed her controlled face carefully. "What about your history with the Genii?" he asked, his tone almost gentle. "SGC say anything about 'unresolved issues' on your part?"  
  
It seemed an obvious question, but it startled her. Her face froze, eyes too wide, and they both jumped when the pencil snapped in her hand. After a pause, she spoke, lips tight, as if holding back words she couldn't or wouldn't say. "SGC says a lot of things, John. Let me deal with them. I want you to get to the bottom of this. But watch yourself."  
  
"Fair enough," he said with a grimace.  
  
*  
  
John had to get out of the office after that. "I'm checking on the repairs," he said to Lorne, but really he just wanted to see Rodney. The conversation with Elizabeth had stirred up bad memories, Kolya, Atlantis in Genii hands. He kept seeing Elizabeth and Rodney as Genii hostages, kept flashing on the scar that still marked Rodney's arm.  
  
And that was all on top of the fact that Lime being alive turned everything about the case on its head. He'd been wrong, dead wrong, believing Lime was out of the picture based on the word of the Genii. His mouth twisted a little as he thought of Anna Schmidt, how she'd called him a fool. Maybe she was onto something there.  
  
A Marine stopped him as he exited the transporter on the level where Rodney was working. "Hard hat area, sir," she said and handed him one.   
  
Rodney was supervising the repair crew working on Atlantis' ballast tanks and shot him a startled glance when he noticed John's presence. He jogged over with a smile on his face.   
  
"Hey," Rodney said. "Playing hooky from work?"  
  
"A little," he admitted. He didn't feel like rehashing his day so far, the vaguely queasy feeling he'd gotten from bullying Anna Schmidt, the frustration of dealing with Brodsky.   
  
John didn't say anything more, but the quiet didn't last long. Rodney, like nature, abhorred a vacuum, and was more than willing to fill the silence with explanations and grandiose predictions of when they'd finally be finished with this section. He didn't know when Rodney's patter had gone from annoying to soothing, but it had happened at some point, fairly early on. John let the sound fill him up, felt his jaw muscles unclench finally.   
  
He looked over at the group of welders Rodney was pointing out and tuned into Rodney's words for a moment. "At least,  _this_  group has some modicum of skill, a tiny grasp on how not to screw things up, unlike the last group SGC sent up," Rodney was saying, and John smiled.   
  
Rodney shot him a strange look, affection tangled with confusion, but didn't stop talking.  
  
He let his eyes play over Rodney, sweaty and smudged, in old clothes, a bright yellow hard hat perched on his head. The hard hat was triggering construction worker fantasies in the dirtier parts of John's mind, and he felt a sudden urge to kiss Rodney silly right then and there. He wanted to run his hands up under Rodney's black T-shirt, to trace the sweaty, warm skin over Rodney's ribs. Rodney would light up under his touch, a way to remind himself that there were things outside of work, beyond Brodsky and the Genii, beyond the Lime situation. Things he hadn't fucked up. Things he'd gotten completely right.  
  
Rodney was busy though, distracted by shouted questions. After a few minutes, he had to go back to work. John stayed a while after to watch Rodney in his element, gesticulating and raising his voice and rallying his troops.  
  
Immediately after the war, they'd started repairing the damaged towers of Atlantis only to realize that the city's flotation system needed immediate attention or their floating city would become a sinking city. Rodney had made fast and dirty repairs to the tanks, buying them some time. The jury-rigged fix left the city still partially flooded, but the influx of refugees meant that most of Rodney's time was diverted to making a huge number of living quarters habitable to some degree. Now that they had some breathing room on the refugee front, Rodney's team had started the permanent repairs.  
  
Lorne radioed him then. "Martins is here. He says he met with Lime, and he looks pretty spooked."  
  
 _Shit_. "I'm coming," John replied. One last look over at Rodney, and he smiled a little as he ogled Rodney's ass. One of the scientists caught him at it, and John winked at her. She wiped her sweaty forehead and laughed, shaking her head.   
  
Martins was in John's office when he got back. Shoulders hunched, he sat at the edge of his chair, staring down at the floor. If anything, Lorne had understated Martins' emotional distress; he looked like a wreck.  
  
"Martins," John said, modulating his voice so as not to spook the man even more.  
  
Martins spoke without looking up. "He's changed. He sounded crazy, going on about killing people if the price was right. It made him furious that I wouldn't join in with him."  
  
John settled at his desk. Martins was trembling, and when he looked up at John, his expression was bewildered, betrayed.   
  
"Lime's in the Genii sector," John said. It wasn't a question, but Martins nodded.  
  
"He didn't care about Anna; he was the one who gave her up to the Genii." Martins' eyes looked wet and lost, as if he couldn't fathom the man who'd betray a lover. "When he thought I was the only one standing in his way, he was going to kill me, I just know it. I could see it in his eyes."  
  
"He's a dangerous man," John murmured. "A dangerous man who needs to be stopped. You could help us. Arrange to meet Lime here, in the Atlantean sector."  
  
Martins shook his head. "Wouldn't work."  
  
"We'll never get him in the Genii zone," John said.  
  
"Colonel Sheppard, you expect too much. I know he deserves a dark cell for the rest of his life for the things he's done. You've proved your stuff. But twenty years of friendship. That's a long time. Don't ask me to be the bait."  
  
John felt his lips tighten. "Okay, forget it," he said in a clipped voice.   
  
He rummaged around in his desk drawer, pulling out the disk encoded with Schmidt's forged identification. He waved it in Martins' direction. "The joint powers meeting is tomorrow, you know. Brodsky's going to ask for Anna Schmidt's return to the Genii."  
  
Martins' face was blank, the subtle threat taking a moment to sink in. His eyes moved from the disk to John's face, his expression stricken.   
  
John continued. "We didn't defeat the Wraith until we knew them."  _And sold our souls to the Genii_ , he thought but didn't say aloud. "Knew them as well as we know ourselves. I'm beginning to know Lime. I think this would have worked with your help."  
  
Martins seemed hypnotized by the disk that John held up in the air. Not taking his eyes off it, Martins asked slowly, "What price would you pay?"  
  
"Name it," John said.  
  
*  
  
John knew when Schmidt failed to make the 'gate activation he'd talked Elizabeth into authorizing that something had gone wrong. He sighed. It'd been a tricky move anyway, trying to pull an end run around the Genii. It would have resulted in severe repercussions, complicated an already tense situation, and Elizabeth had not been happy. But getting Anna Schmidt away from the Genii had been Martins' price for setting up the meet. Getting Lime was worth it.  
  
Elizabeth had agreed. "Dead children," she said, her eyes narrowing. "Lime killed children. SGC can say what it wants; we're getting him."  
  
Neither of them had mentioned that keeping Schmidt from the Genii would have served a less noble purpose as well, serving as an unmistakable "fuck you" back to the Genii, a little payback for their involvement with Lime. The Genii seemed to instinctively understand things like that, but the Atlanteans were learning.  
  
Martins came to John's office later that day. Before John could open his mouth, Martins was talking. "I want off Atlantis. As soon as possible."  
  
John rubbed the back of his neck, digging out the tension knots. "So she talked you out of it."  
  
His expression more hurt than angry, Martins slid something across John's desk, the shattered pieces of an identification disk. Schmidt's, John realized.   
  
"She gave me these," Martins said. He sounded lost, his face shadowed.   
  
"Spirited, isn't she," John said dryly, one eyebrow climbing towards his hairline.  
  
Martins' mouth twisted. "She's right. It  _is_  none of my business."  
  
 _And she's got you under her thumb, doesn't she_ , John thought, shoving the broken pieces of the data disk into the trash with more force than necessary.  
  
His anger faded before a genuine curiosity. The loss of Lime had brought the two of them together, mutual obsessions reinforcing each other. Had Lime's resurrection driven them apart?  
  
"What'd she say to you?" John asked.  
  
Martins flinched, his mouth twisting in a guilty frown. "She couldn't do anything to harm him. She loves him. And--"   
  
 _So do you_ , John thought, frowning at Martins.   
  
Martins shrugged, not finishing his thought.  
  
"It won't make any difference in the long run. I'll get him," John promised, letting a tight smile slide over his face.  
  
Martins' eyes darted away from John's, one shoulder hunching, a defensive posture. "Well, I won't have helped."  
  
"Whatever lets you sleep at night, Martins," John said sourly. "I always wanted you out of the city, didn't I?"   
  
"You all did." Martins sounded resentful, as if nothing in Atlantis had lived up to his expectations. He was someone who set himself up for disappointment, forever unhappy with reality. His eyes were sad and soulful, inviting sympathy, but John felt a little burned out in that department.  
  
John stood. "Let's go to the gate room right now. We might get you an activation this afternoon."  
  
They made their way down to the transporter, and John set the destination to the infirmary level. Martins seemed to change his mind in a stiff breeze. Maybe John could sway him back. If anything, John wasn't going to let the Halorian off easy. Martins would see close up what Lime had done before he got his trip off Atlantis.  
  
"You don't mind a quick detour, do you?" John said, striding out of the transporter without waiting for Martins' answer.   
  
Martins stopped short when he realized what the detour consisted of, but John walked on. He nodded at the nurses and was glad Beckett stayed out of sight while he led Martins back to the private room that had been had set aside. Beckett might agree with the end to John's means, but he probably wouldn't like John using his patients this way.  
  
John gestured at the two beds that were against the far wall. "This is where they keep the children whose treatment started late because of Lime, the ones who didn't die, that is. The transformation isn't reversible at this point."  
  
The twisted figure on one of the beds moaned softly, arching against the sheets. Revulsion and pity twisted Martins' face as he stared down at the little girl. There was little human left visible in her.  
  
"Her name is Caltis," John said. "The boy is Perrin."  
  
John led Martin between the two beds, keeping silent after that, letting the horror speak for itself. He stood there, watching Martin's head swivel back in forth, taking in the pasty gray of their skin, the yellow eyes.  
  
The boy shifted on his bed, his mouth opening wide. He let out a sound that morphed into a piercing Wraith cry. It was like a spike in John's head, razors down his spine, and he looked over to see Martins with his hands over his ears.  
  
The noise thankfully stopped, and Martins let his hands drop. He turned to John. "I've seen enough, Sheppard. I'll be your dumb decoy."  
  
*  
  
They had Martins set up the meet in one of the atriums that dotted the city, filled with Ancient fountains dry for 10,000 years and sleek metal benches. It was an out of the way spot, usually deserted, next door as it was to one of the damaged sections of Atlantis. Holes with blackened edges gaped in the outer walls, the damage yet another reminder of the war, another part of the city still in disrepair. John avoided looking at the blasted section, his eyes flickering past, concentrating on the smell of the ocean that drifted in through the opening.   
  
A balcony encircled the open space of the atrium, and John sent a few Marines up there. Lorne set up a perimeter as well, enough Marines to make a net for Lime when he showed up.  
  
Martins slumped on one of the benches, while Lorne and John watched from an alcove in the shadow of the balcony.   
  
"I'd kill for a working scanner," Lorne said absently. "It'd make this so much easier."  
  
John shrugged. The labs had been one of the Wraith's first targets. The few remaining scanners had eventually broken down, and the necessary replacement parts were all dedicated to restoring Atlantis.   
  
They'd been lucky to lose only equipment in the attack. A few hours later -- he couldn't finish the thought, stifling a shudder. Rodney would have been there. Most of his staff would have been as well, but John was honest enough to admit that it was Rodney's near miss that gave him nightmares.  
  
They waited, the moments stretching out endlessly, the corridors around them deserted and silent. He could almost imagine Atlantis breathing around them, damaged and injured as she was. They watched Martins, who sat staring at his feet. He crossed his arms, clutching his biceps as if he was cold.  
  
John kept shifting his weight, until Lorne raised an eyebrow at him.  _I hate waiting_ , he thought with a sigh, but forced himself to stand still.  
  
"Look." Lorne nudged him. It was Schmidt, coming up to Martins.   
  
Lorne asked, "Should I go over there?"  
  
If Lime was close by and watching, Lorne might scare him off. If they waited, Schmidt might leave on her own. John shook his head. "No, no, leave them for a while."  
  
Martins sat there, Schmidt standing over him. He'd straightened hopefully at her approach, but he slumped again after a few minutes of conversation. Schmidt's gestures were agitated, her face set in an angry frown. It was the most overt emotion John had seen her display yet.  
  
John frowned. Instead of Schmidt leaving, she and Martins were getting deeper into conversation. This didn't look good. He was going to have to risk it. "Lorne, go over there, see what she's up to," he said.  
  
Lorne nodded, shifting and resettling his vest as he walked over. John tried to watch everything at once, Martins and Schmidt, Lorne, their surroundings. His vigilance wasn't quite up to the job; when it happened, it still managed to catch him by surprise.  
  
There was movement behind Schmidt, and then-- "He's here," Lorne shouted. He turned and was off running.   
  
John broke cover himself, running after Lorne. Martins was right on Lorne's heels; he must have been caught up in the heat of the chase. "Martins, stop," John shouted, but the warning was ignored.  
  
He used his radio, clicking over to the command frequency. "Givens, Theriot, Lime's here. Looks like he's heading for the damaged zone, trying to get below again, down into the flooded sections."  
  
The loud sound of his own breathing almost masked the radio response as he pounded after Lorne. His pace slowed when he hit the blasted section, threading his way through torn metal, carefully watching where he stepped.   
  
His caution almost made him lose Lorne. He looked up just in time to see Lorne and Martins jump down through a gaping hole in the decking. He rushed over to follow them, jumping down to the deck below. It was a long way down. His knees flexed, taking the brunt of his weight when he landed. The faint crunching sound and the ache of the motion made him grimace. Bad knees were just one part of being on the wrong side of forty, but it still felt like his body was betraying him.  
  
It was pitch black in the corridor below, and the dim glow of emergency lighting was the only illumination besides their flashlights. The dim figures of Lorne and Martins were just ahead; he'd finally caught up with them. He frowned. Martins had no business being in on the chase. Was he trying to get himself killed?  
  
"Martins, get back," John said, but Martins didn't seem to hear, stopping in a dangerously exposed spot in the middle of the corridor. Lorne grabbed Martins' wrist, pulling the man bodily back against one wall.  
  
After that, it was all confusion and darkness, feet pounding, murky water that splashed everywhere, shouts. Their path twisted and turned, until John wondered if he'd be able to find his way out without help. He wiped at his forehead with a sleeve: he was dripping. The sweat clung to him, sticky and unpleasant; it combined with the dampness of the flooded corridor so that his uniform felt clammy and chafing.   
  
Voices, fragments of an exchange echoed back to where John ran.   
  
"You're through, Lime." That was Martins voice. "--haven't got a chance this way. You might as well give up."  
  
"What do you want?" The deep-voiced response must be Lime. John eased his sidearm from its holster.  
  
Lorne's voice interrupted the exchange. "Martins. Martins, get back." Shouts echoed weirdly through the corridor, and John could see him gesturing wildly at Martins.  
  
"Lorne, be careful," John shouted after him, but his words were drowned out by a shot. The muzzle flash revealed Lime's location, and John fired at the shadowy figure. Lime stumbled, but kept running, and then John's attention was focused on Lorne.   
  
"Fucking hell," John muttered as he ran over. Martins crouched down beside Lorne, who lay in a crumpled heap, facedown on the wet floor of the corridor. John shoved Martins aside, putting a hand on Lorne's shoulder.  
  
"Lorne," he whispered, easing the man onto his back. Blood poured from a chest wound, warm and metallic-smelling. "Oh, God." He pressed down onto the wound, desperately trying to stop the bleeding. Triggering his radio, he glanced over at Martin, whose face was white. John's own face felt even whiter as he spoke into his headset. "This is Sheppard. Medical emergency. Lorne's down. Beckett, get your ass down here now."  
  
John looked up. "Martins, I need--" Martins was gone. "Martins? Martins!" he shouted, and then Lorne made a noise. John looked down, his gaze landing on Lorne's right hand. It was empty, fingers loosely curled. Lorne's thigh holster was empty as well. His sidearm was gone: Martins must have taken it while John was busy with Lorne's wound.   
  
"Don't take any chances, Martins. If you see him, shoot," he shouted, hoping his voice carried. It echoed through the corridor, and he pressed harder on Lorne's wound, where blood continued to well. Too much blood, so much it made John's gut clench with fear.  
  
"Don't you die on me, Lorne," he said in a frantic voice. "You don't get to fucking die on me now."  
  
Lorne let out a groan. "That's it," John urged. "That's good. You didn't survive the war to get yourself killed by a goddamned racketeer."  
  
A single shot made him start, and then Martins' slow, careful steps echoed through the corridor as he walked back into sight. Lorne's sidearm was in one of Martins' hands, held awkwardly away from his body. Shoulders slumped under an awful weight, Martins seemed to have aged years in a matter of minutes. The look in his eyes was haunted, the look of someone who'd had to kill a friend.   
  
Beckett and a medical team were shoving John aside then, trying to get to their patient. "Anyone else need attention?" Carson asked, his voice distracted but calm as he ripped open Lorne's shirt.  
  
Martins looked over at John, shaking his head. His features were pinched now, no longer boyish. John answered for him. "No. No one else."  
  
*  
  
Lime's second funeral was warmer and sunnier than his first. It felt almost like spring, and the irony didn't escape John.   
  
The last time he'd been here with Lorne, who was currently recovering in the infirmary. It'd been a near thing, but Lorne would pull through. Every time John thought about it, he went weak-kneed with relief. He didn't know if he could have handled the death of yet another friend, someone who'd been there from practically the beginning.  
  
Once again, he stood far from the grave, hanging back to take in the ceremony without really participating. Rodney had come with him this time and hovered at his side. Rodney claimed it was to get away from the endless repairs, but he couldn't hide the worry in his eyes when he looked at John.   
  
Rodney stood a little closer than he normally did in public, and John had to admit that he welcomed the support. It felt good, the warmth of Rodney right next to him, Rodney's shoulder brushing his.   
  
Anna Schmidt stood beside the grave. Martins was there as well, staring over at her, the look on his face wistful. Her expression was empty and still, and she didn't acknowledge Martins' presence, her grief betrayed only by the dark circles under her eyes. There were no tears this time.   
  
The tableau didn't escape Rodney's attention. Rodney nudged his arm, gesturing over at Martins and Schmidt. "From the way you talked, I thought it was  _Lime_  that Martins was hung up over," Rodney whispered.   
  
"It was," John whispered back.  
  
"Oh," Rodney said after a beat. Comprehension flickered across his face, and when he spoke there was a brisk compassion in his voice. "Poor bastard."  
  
The ceremony was ending. Martins had moved closer to where John stood with Rodney, hovering by the gates of the cemetery. He waited, staring at Schmidt as the mourners filed past him.   
  
"Wait here a second," John said. "I'm going over to him." Rodney's eyes flickered over John's face, and he nodded, squeezing John's shoulder.   
  
"Colonel Sheppard," Martins said, not turning his head when John came up beside him. "You don't have to stay. I'll take the public transport back." John nodded but didn't move away. They stood there a moment, and Martins continued. "Can't you do something about Anna?"  
  
"I'll do what I can," John said. "If she'll let me."  
  
Schmidt was drawing closer to them, and Martins twitched, taking a step towards her.  
  
"I wouldn't," John warned.   
  
"I can't just leave her." Martins' voice broke on the last word.   
  
John shrugged and didn't say anything when Martins stepped away from him, to stand almost directly in Schmidt's path. Her steps were purposeful, and her head was held high, her eyes dry.   
  
John was staring at Martins' back. He couldn't see Martins' face, but John knew that the man was smiling tentatively at Schmidt, his eyes hopeful. John almost turned away then, because he also knew what would come next.   
  
Schmidt didn't hesitate, striding past Martins without a glance. She walked down the path, away from them, looking straight ahead of her. It was to be expected. Martins had killed her lover, his own oldest friend. It was a betrayal in service to a greater good, but a betrayal nonetheless.   
  
Rodney's hand at the small of his back startled him. "Ready?" Rodney asked, his mouth right by John's ear, his breath warm on John's skin. Something that had been wound up tight in his chest eased a little.   
  
He turned his head, smiling at Rodney. "You bet," he said.   
  
Rodney let out a huff of breath, not quite a laugh. "I was just talking to Beckett. Lorne's awake."   
  
They walked along, their feet crunching through the brown, fallen leaves that littered the ground. Rodney left his hand where it was, a warm pressure on John's back. The trees were bare, but the sun was warm on John's face. Looking up at the cloudless sky, John let out a contented sigh. He slid an arm over Rodney's shoulders as they neared the puddle jumper. "That's good. That's really good."  
  
"Hmm," Rodney agreed.  
  
"You wanna take her back?" John asked as he used the remote to lower the puddle jumper's ramp.  
  
"Nah." Rodney shook his head. "How about you fly? Fly us home, John."


End file.
